I want you to imagine for a moment, being able to ask a master at a skill or profession, any question, so whatever your preferred sport or hobby or profession is, imagine getting a one on one lesson from the expert, the best in the world? That'd be pretty cool, wouldn't it? People ask them to teach you to do anything. In fact it's actually a growing industry, they're different platforms, call it different things, but maybe you've seen these advertised online, they offer master classes and these master classes, get these world renowned experts and then you can learn a craft or a skill set from them, so you can learn from the best chefs in the world or you can learn how to shoot from Steph curry or you can learn how to, you know, write a screenplay or craft a song and it's a cool concept to learn from the leaders in those given fields, people who are known across the world and you can ask them a question or you can learn from them how to do a particular skill? Well this is exactly what the disciples had available to them, they had jesus with them, the creator and savior of the world, They saw crazy things and they could ask him to teach them how to do anything, like if I'm them, I'm like signing up for miracles 101, you know like hey jesus when you, when you turned that fish and bread into Feeding 5000, can you, can you teach me how to do that when you rebuked the storm, could I, could I tell me how like do I say be still first or do I extend the hand first? Like how does that work, jesus, can you help me out? Some of you might like the whole water to wine miracle say hey, I'd like to learn that, that would come in handy, okay, some of you like that a little too much, but that's okay, we'll pray for you and you know, so imagine that you could ask jesus to teach you anything. But what's interesting is that the disciples didn't ask jesus to teach them how to do miracles. They didn't ask jesus to teach them to preach, they didn't ask him to say, hey jesus, remember when you raised Lazarus from the dead, like I want to learn that one, can you teach me that one? Do you know what they asked Jesus to teach? I said in Luke 11, the disciple said teach us to Pray. Now at first glance it seems like they went a little low, right, like you have access to the Savior of the world, raise dead people to life, crippled people to walk food out of nothing, walking on water and you go, hey, can you teach us to pray? But here's what I believe was the case Is that in the gospels, Jesus is described as praying 30 different times, over 30 different times and he prayed just different than what they knew like they had, they had heard or seen people pray before, they were around religious people, but not like Jesus, jesus had this connection with God the father in a way that was so strong, that was so different that I think the disciples thought if we could pray like that we would get access to the power that does everything else. So prayer wasn't low, in fact prayer was the first priority and they saw his connection and so they said, jesus teach us to pray because he prayed so often and it was so much a part of who he was. They realized that jesus, it was different if you're taking notes, I want you to write this down that the purpose of prayer is the presence of God, the purpose of prayer is the presence of God, jesus talked to God the father in a way that just hadn't been received before, he talked like he knew him, not like he knew about him, but he actually knew him. See their examples all throughout the gospels. For example, you have in Mark 1 35 he says, and rising very early in the morning while it was still dark, jesus departed and went outside to a desolate place and there he prayed, Another example in Luke chapter five he says. But now even more, the report about jesus went abroad and great crowds gathered to hear him and be healed of their infirmities, so his ministry is growing more and more people are coming to him. His schedule is getting busier and busier and busier and how does jesus respond, but he would withdraw to desolate places and pray. It seemed like the busier he got, the more important he prioritized his prayer life, it's like there was something there, so what does that mean for us? Because if you ask anybody who is religious and I say religious in a very general sense because even non christians will claim the idea of prayer right? Like no one that I know of thinks prayer is like an awful thing you pray, like even people who don't believe in God don't believe in Christianity when something bad happens, what Emoji is going up praying for you, sending you thoughts and prayers thoughts, I don't know how that works right, like if you don't believe in God like who exactly you're talking to, but like but we do that why? Because we know that prayer is a good thing, but you don't have to raise your hand right now, but I want you to be honest for a moment and you can nod or give me a look, I don't know but how many of you here? I would say that you would like to have a better prayer life. See from my experience, most people acknowledge that prayer is a good thing, but then also feel like they're not doing it well and then there's this thing of like shame and guilt that creeps in and it's like well I'm not A monk in a monastery praying for 15 hours a day and I'm not doing this, I'm not doing that and then shame and guilt comes in, but I don't think God created prayer, who gave us the blessing and the gift of prayer for us to feel shame and guilt. And also if they decide to think about this for a moment, if the disciples realized that the power for their faith was directly connected to their prayer and relationship with God, what area do you think satan's gonna attack? So he's going to distract us is gonna make us feel bad that we don't know what we're doing that, how to do it, but we actually have jesus direct words to teach us, we have the master teacher giving us the master class to give us empowered prayer. So the disciples asked him, hey jesus how teach us to pray like that, how do you pray? Here's his response Matthew chapter six verse 5, he says, when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites, I love this, teach us to pray, Hey don't be like these guys, he starts by saying what not to do. So in this case they're surrounded by a lot of Pharisees and religious leaders and she's saying don't don't be like these Pharisees, don't be like the hypocrites, I didn't mean to point in this corner, sorry you guys are great, well point back this way there we go, Don't be like the hypocrites for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners that they may be seen by others truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. So these are the appearance of religious people who boldly proclaim their prayers before the world, but really they're praying to people and not to God. Now, jesus doesn't say that praying in public is bad. In fact, scripture is filled with the currencies of public prayer. In fact, the church that started in Acts 21 of the early markers of the church was that they would gather and pray together publicly. So he's not saying public prayer is bad, What he's saying is don't pray for the appearance of others. Do I have any golfers in the room and golfers in the room and you wanna be golfers in the room, we'll say same category. Okay, you might be familiar with this phrase if you've played golf or been around the game, you drive for show and you put put for dough, right, what does that mean? Well, if you have a long drive, it's exciting, it looks great. But at the end of the day, it's ken you put the ball in the hole, can you finish? Because that's what makes the difference in the match. It's almost as if jesus is saying here, don't pray for show, don't pray for other people, but pray to know, you know me personally. So he says don't pray like the Pharisees, okay, they're, they're reward is already what they get in front of them. But then he goes on in verse seven here and he says this, he says, and when you pray, don't heap empty phrases as the gentiles do. So you're saying don't pray like the Pharisees, but then don't pray like the pagan either for they think that they will be heard for their many words do not be like them for your father knows what you need before you ask him. So don't pray like the pagan. Don't pray as the world praise because what happens is that there's throwing up empty phrases if you're trying to eat healthy, may be familiar with that phrase or idea of empty calories. Don't fill your prayers with empty calories, words that are just saying stuff but really have no meaning. It's almost like taking a message in a bottle in the ocean and just throwing it out there and hope somebody somewhere someday we'll hear it. So part of being a portable churches that there have been multiple times throughout our brief tenure of loading in and out of a trailer. Well when I was borrowing a neighbor's trailer and I was trying to clean it and adjust it. What I forgot to do was I forgot to lock the door at the bottom when I'm getting in and it wasn't attached to a vehicle yet because I had unhooked it. And so I stepped on it and I'm not the lightest person. We'll just say that okay, you don't have to nod super like an agreement to that I would appreciate. No, not you. Anyway, so I stepped on the back of the trailer, what do you think happened when there was, it wasn't attached, it like went up and I thought this is how I die. This is how it ends and then and the trailer goes back. I didn't even tell my wife this because I just didn't tell anyone because I was embarrassed and just went boom. And I was like, whoa! And then went back and then like make sure, okay, I need to adjust this. Why did that happen? Well, the trailer wasn't attached to anything. And so when you put some weight in it, the trailer couldn't handle the weight distribution. Sometimes people who don't have a relationship with God will claim they prey, but their prayers are like trying to load a trailer that's not attached, you're throwing in these phrases in these words, but it's the trailers just flipping up because you're not attached to anything if you're not attached to the god that you're praying to, it's not about the words you say, but the God you pray to, does that make sense? And so God is saying that jesus is saying don't pray like the fares, please don't pray for show, don't pray like the pagans that just throw up empty words and phrases, but instead pray like this, he gives us what's called the Lord's prayer, it's this awesome picture. But what I want to try to do this morning is to approach the Lord's prayer, we might have said it many, many times growing up, maybe a religious tradition for you, maybe this morning was the first time you've ever said it wherever you fall on the spectrum. I want you to know that these words have so much incredible power when you look at phrase by phrase. So let's do that together, Jesus says this like this, our father in heaven, its presence, that's presence. Now we just kind of go past that phrase, that's just the opening line. But you have to understand that when jesus said this, no other religion claimed God as father, that's about access my little girl Chloe just turned five, she has the freedom and the access to come into my room at three in the morning and say dad, can I get some water now, I love you all very much. But if one of you in this room came into my house at 3:00 AM, right, like I'm good friends with Jeff sitting right there, but Jeff, if you woke me at three in the morning tapping my shoulder, hey john best job I get some water. That's weird why? Because of the relationship. And so the fact that we get to call God father sets up the rest of the prayer, it's personal. And while religion typically says I'm okay with God, but I'm not okay with you. And then secular living says I'm okay with you, but I'm not okay with God, jesus comes in and when he prays, he starts his prayer with an acknowledgement of the presence of his father. Now for some people, they connect to the love that they have for their parents or their Children, but for some people in the room, I want to acknowledge the fact that that word, our father might be a trigger for you because you might not have had the best earthly father. And what I want to encourage you with is that even if you had a broken home, you have a perfect father and when he sees you, he doesn't say get your act together, he doesn't say, hey earn my love, he says, I'm here. How many people go through life spending their entire lives trying to fix a broken father wound when thankfully we have a heavenly father, it says, I'm here, I'm accessible, I'm present and I don't see you as broken, I see you as whole. I don't see you as a project, I see you as my child. Do you approach God that way secondly though he goes from the intimate to the infinite our father who art in heaven, hallowed, be thy name. Now there are people in your life that you might be able to state, father, mother child spouse, a sibling. But I guarantee you can't say that second statement, hollowed be thy name. So you have the personal and then you have the powerful. This is an acknowledgement of praise. So instead of coming to jesus asking you to bless your food and to um give us traveling mercies and things and those are, I'm not saying don't pray for those things. What I want to say is that there's so much more that you have intimate and infinite together. Then you can say our father, who knows me, who loves me, who is present, Hallowed be thy name. You are powerful, you created the world, you saved it, you conquered death. This is the God that I'm praying to. So you have presents and then you have praise. The sense of awe and respect of coming before the God who loves you and created you. Then he continues on and he says, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. That's purpose. We said that the purpose of prayer is the presence of God. That's what you're praying for, is that you are inviting God to come into your life and for his will to be done. I wonder what the church would look like if we truly invited heaven to come down to earth instead of living in a way that invited hell to come up to earth. That when we act and live in a way we invite satan up with our choices it's me, I want to reject God, I'm gonna choose myself, I'm gonna choose myself. That's why prayer is so powerful. Because what you're saying is I'm gonna deny myself and ask God's will to come into my life, I'm gonna ask for God's will to come into my marriage. I'm gonna ask for God's will to come into my parenting into my workplace. Because God's kingdom, God's power, God's will changes everything. Jesus modeled this to think about right before Jesus went to the cross when jesus is praying in the garden of Gethsemane and he's praying and he's and he is getting to the crucial point of the prayer and he's saying, God take this cup from me. If there's any other way to do so, what is he saying? He says, but not my will, but yours be done. This is what he's praying by praying your kingdom. Come your acknowledging that there, it's not fully here yet. And so you're praying God into your marriage, You're praying God into your life and it changes everything that's purpose. And then he goes on and he says here, so give us this day, our daily bread, that's provisions, you know, in the old testament. The people of Israel Wandered for 40 years and they were sustained how often every day God would bring the stuff on the ground and they would pick it up and they called it manna. Do you know what mana means? It means it literally means what is it? They walked outside there like what is it? Oh cool. That's the name. Sometimes God's provision is vague. You don't even know exactly what God's doing. You just know he's taking care of something and you're like, what is it exactly? And they praise God for it now. I really wish it said give us our yearly bread or monthly bread. Like God does it really have to be daily? Like I struggle with this and sometimes still struggle even now just being transparent with you as a pastor, as a husband, as a dad, as a church planner. We lost our location, didn't meet For eight months, seven months, whatever it was. And we're praying for a spot. And then I get to this part of the prayer. I'm like give us this day. Ah man, okay, okay, God, I'll trust you because that's what provision means. We've talked about this before to that seeing God as provider means vision to see pro to go before. So to trust God as your provider means that God sees what you need before you do and he's going to do that. Next phrase, he goes on he says and forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors. That's pardon? That's a pardon this idea that and it goes with provisions. Think about it. Give us our bread just as give us our forgiveness that God has provided the forgiveness and the love that is possible. And if you've received that, then it gives you the ability to forgive others. Forgiveness says a lot more about you than the person that hurts you. Forgiving someone doesn't mean that what that person did to you is okay. Forgiving someone means that you're not gonna let that action, that thing be your identity, that you're not gonna become bitter, that you're gonna let go and realize that God has forgiven you. Therefore that empowers you to go and forgive others. And it's a hard process. I'm not saying that like something traumatic and awful has happened to you and you can just go if I forgive you, mm hmm. There are some things that happen to people that you're gonna wrestle with that the rest of your life. But what this prayer reminds us of is that it's possible through the God that provides And the God that forgives now, he gives an intense warning about this in a few verses, but we're gonna wait until we get there. So for now just acknowledge that Part of Prayer is his partner, his forgiveness. The next one lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. This is God's protection. So you can see the process. He's our father, he's present, hallowed, be thy name, that's praise your kingdom come God come into my life, that's purpose. Give us our daily bread. That's for your provision. God forgive me of my sins. That's pardon, protect me from the temptation and the evil that's around this world. God, I need you in my life and that allows you to go through. There's so much power, this is what the disciples wanted to tap into. Now, even as we prayed here, we ended the Lord's prayer for thine is the kingdom right? And the power and the glory forever. Amen. And when you say amen, that means like this is true or I believe this, you are kind of your stamp of approval. This is what I believe. But that phrase was actually really added by scholars, commentators, church tradition because I think we want to end with that powerful yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory. So it's very much true and very much practical, but what does jesus do to end the prayer when he's teaching his disciples? He says this in verse 1415, He says, for if you forgive others, their trespasses, your heavenly father will also forgive you. Okay, cool, I like that one, I like 14 And then 15 goes, but if you do not forgive others, their trespasses, neither will your father forgive you. Hold up, hold up jesus, I don't like that one, I like the 1st 1. Why are you, why are you throwing that? Why you don't need to put that in there, jesus. That's the next lesson. You know, we don't need that in our prayer, but what's the first thing jesus did when he said, teach us to pray, he said, don't be a hypocrite, right? He's reinforcing that message here, and he's saying, don't be a hypocrite in other words, if you forgive those who have hurt you, you are growing in your understanding of how I have forgiven you and so your ability to forgive helps grow your understanding of your own forgiveness. And because if you're holding onto something, if you're really holding on to something, it's really hard to receive a gift when your hands aren't open. And so what he's saying there is that if you can open your hand, if you can release the pain, the struggle, the hurt that you felt from others, then you're in a place, you're in a position, you're in a posture to receive the forgiveness that I offer you because this Lord's prayer is so incredibly powerful if we experience it, and so here's what I want to do, I want the band to come up on stage and I don't want to just teach on prayer, I mean that's nice, you can walk out like, oh, that was good, I want to actually give you a chance to experience the prayer that we're talking about? So over the next couple of minutes, I'm gonna pray back through the Lord's prayer, but we're going to pause and reflect and give you an opportunity to experience with the disciples experienced with jesus experience and if you're like john this is weird. Yes, it is, but just just try it, what do you got to lose? You're already in the room, you're already watching. Just just give me a minute here because I don't know about you, it just seems like our world is always filled with, go, go, go here, next, next go go and we always feel like we're trying to catch up to something, right? If you're at home, you feel like man, I'm trying to catch up at work, if you're at work, it's like I'm trying to catch up at home, I should do this more, I should do this more, I need a man, I dropped this and it's battle and battle and question and doubt and yet the disciples looked at jesus and they said, man, he is peaceful, mhm raise people from the dead, the crowds, the persecution, the questioning, the doubts. Yeah, he could walk an unhurried way, I think it's because of his prayer because the purpose of prayer is the presence of God, so I want us to take a few moments and pray pray as if God is in the room, pray as if God is in your life and if you're new to this, that there's, you don't have to be like quote unquote, an expert at this, just give them what you got start, where you are, if it's your first time in churches, like like just try it, You can benefit from just having a few moments of quietness in your heart, but in so I want to invite you to pray to the God who made you. Let's do so. Our father who are in heaven. Mhm Take a few moments and reflect on that God loves you. Do you have access to him? He knows you, he's here. If you have something in your past that's keeping you. Mm hmm. No that God doesn't see and look at you with shame or guilt. He sees you as a son or daughter. That you or enough. The heat. It's enough. He cares for our father who art in heaven. Hallowed be your name. Mm hmm. But we experience your presence. Thank you for creating us. Thank you for saving us. God, your kingdom. Come your will be done on earth as it isn't him reflect on that for a moment. Whatever your area of doubt or question, pray for God's will to be done. I had to come into my marriage, come into my parenting, come into my workplace. Come into my attitude and my habits and my choices. You want your will not mine And God give us this day our daily bread, whatever your needs are big and small. Mhm Give those to him now. Mm hmm. Mhm. God forgive us, forgive us of our trespasses and our debts and our sins as we have forgiven those who trespass against us. If you're struggling right now to forgive. I asked you just ask God to remind you of his forgiveness. God lead us not into temptation, deliver us for me, help us to live for you, your son's name, we pray. How are you feeling right now compared to when you walked in, How are you feeling right now? You sense that piece. That even for just a moment, that's the power of prayer And it's not about the words you say but the God you pray to when when my Children were learning to talk didn't always say things or pronounce things correctly. But it's so much more to recognize that it's about the presence of the parent, not the words of the child. Mm hmm. So here's what I want you to do. Yeah. Mhm. Is that I want you to go every day this week. At some point in your day to pause is say the Lord's prayer and maybe on that given day you'll focus on one phrase or one part. Will you take time to connect to God this week And then second I want to encourage you again to download that prayer guide that it goes deeper into what we talked about today. Go deeper in your faith because the disciples could have asked jesus anything and they asked him to teach them to pray. This prayer is connected to everything else. And then lastly I want you to sing this last song which is a prayer, This prayer comes from the old testament. This prayer is a prayer of blessing and when we sing, amen, we are saying this is true, I believe God you ray God, I believe this. And so we want to pray over you. We want to pray over your family. We want to pray blessing into your life. But the blessing is God himself and so if you're listening later on podcasts to just take this in and and to to respond if you are watching this online and while doing other things, I want to encourage you just to pause that activity for just a moment here in the room whether it's standing or sitting down, whether it's hands up, hands out, eyes open, eyes closed whatever the response looks like for you, I want you to respond in song in prayer together as the church. I wanna invite you to stand. Let us sing this prayer together. Mhm Lord bless you and keep you make his face shine upon the Lord Yeah and God bless you and keep you make his face shine be gracious. No and Amen. Ah mm hmm. Oh oh man. Lord bless you and keep you make his face shine upon him. Grace Lord thank you and seeing all men together. Oh oh man. Oh man. Oh oh oh oh I believe Oh man. Oh man yeah baby be upon you. 1000 generations family Children go before you and reside 1000 generations in your family before you, in the high side around you in the morning, in the evening when you come right, this is for you. Here's for you. He is for you. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Mhm ah um ah made by head dear heavenly father. We thank you so much for this blessed time that we get to seeing these truths of who you are. You bless us got in so many. Let's go. May we be your mind this morning of your provision of your guidance God. We thank you so much for your love that you continue to show your face. God may we just get to see your face this week. God may your favorite be upon us. God nearly continue to be so grateful for who you are and maybe go out to our communities into our homes God and be a reflection of your love that you have shown us. You have been so faithful, you have been so kind to us. And as one body As one church we get to be unified and safe and we get to his truth is gone, we love you and you pray this all new precious and God's people said amen Well it's so great worshiping with you this morning. Have a blessed week. We hope to see you next week